STOP IT -- CAN'T BE DONE ALONE -- USUALLY

This is a story about how humans make progress in life.   I only have the one picture that you see here, but I do have one that sticks in my mind's eye and one that really doesn't exist except in the memory of a verbal statement.  The picture that you see here is one of many that were done by elementary school children in a contest that was aimed at making illustrations to try to give the viewers advice about drug use avoidance.    The reason why this illustration impresses me is that there is religious symbolism embedded and depicted as being productive.  I don't know how old Elizabeth Puentes is, but I do know that she succeeded in putting her point across in a well constructed picture.   It does come across as being electronically assembled, but it is nevertheless effective.  It is also quite pleasing to the eye as it is cleanly done.
The reason why I am talking about this is not solely because I discovered this collection of drawings on a church wall.  I am addressing this project because it caused a similar event to pop into my mind.  This was some twenty plus years ago.  Our number two son, who is a very fine artist, participated in such a contest for elementary school children.  He did not get the number one prize, but did finish in the top ten of a contest that included some 4,000 children from across San Diego, CA.  I was disappointed at the result, though I have been silently suffering with it the whole length of time from back then to now.  I thought that technically, the quality seemed to me to be as good as the winner's.  The element that was the most telling, to me, was the fact that Jo-El was the only one who had two humans in the picture, enjoying the company that they provided to one another.  I have since forgotten the exact title of the picture, but it was something like "Happiness is being with a friend."  They were together in a bucolic setting, green rolling hills and lolling in the shade of a majestic Maple tree.  Twenty years later, without knowing the results of the contest that was held at the church, the same reality came to strike me between the eyes.  Only Elizabeth's design has people helping people.  She depicts the devil being blown away by this mutual support.  She is not afraid to admit that it takes humans to support other humans to achieve happiness.  In the case in point, that would be freedom from drug use.
Then, I remembered the statement that was made by one person who was coming back to the Catholic church and was in our hospitality session.  He said that it was thanks to chance encounters with good Samaritans who helped him to have a clearer sense of purpose in his quest for religious peace that he found his way back.   I have a long enough history in the church environment to know that this statement is absolutely correct.
The founders of the ten step program model knew this.  Before them, Jesus knew this.  Before Jesus, His Father knew it.  It is not by chance that King David had his Nathan and that Moses had his Aaron.  Oh, and what about Joshua's spies who were helped by the famous madam, Rahab? [Joshua 2,1]
It is therefore refreshing for me to see that somewhere in this world there are actually very young people who have the conviction that this is the best way to go for the human species.
The display that I beheld the other day was a lot more surprising in another sense.  Given that these were children in the religious education program who produced the "posters," there were precious few that had a religious and/or spiritual element.  I'm still trying to figure out what that is all about.  In public, anyway.
This is a whole bagful of thoughts in one short article.  It's the $0.99 store syndrome in this awful economy.